Paid product placements and endorsements

Note: This article was updated on December 5th, 2018, for clarity and to emphasize that paid product placement or endorsement of a good or service is required to meet Google's Ad policies. Content which is in breach of these ad policy guidelines risk being removed from YouTube and repeat offenses may result in channel-level action.

You may include paid product placements, endorsements, or other content that requires disclosure to viewers ("Paid Promotion") in your video content. If you do, we require you to notify YouTube by checking the "video contains paid promotion" box in your Advanced Settings using the instructions below.

All Paid Promotion needs to conform to our Ad Policies. In addition, creators and brands are responsible for understanding and complying with their legal obligations to disclose Paid Promotion in their content, including when and how to disclose and to whom to disclose (so be sure to check and comply with your legal obligations).

Paid product placements may be described as pieces of content that are created for a third party in exchange for compensation, and/or where that third party's brand, message, or product is integrated directly into the content.

Endorsements may be described as pieces of content created for an advertiser or marketer that contain a message that consumers are likely to believe reflects the opinions, beliefs, or experiences of the content creator or endorser.

Please know that laws that apply to you may define paid product placements and endorsements differently. Creators and brands are responsible for understanding and fully complying with legal obligations to disclose Paid Promotion in their content according to their jurisdiction, including when and how to disclose and to whom to disclose.

When you check the "video contains paid promotion" box under the "Content declaration" section in your Advanced Settings, you’re helping us maintain a great viewer experience.

We will still run ads against these videos. When you notify us that a video includes paid promotion, we may replace an ad that conflicts with your brand partner with an alternative ad. Additionally, when you notify us, we will remove your video from the YouTube Kids app in line with our existing policies.

You may need to. Different jurisdictions have various requirements for creators and brands involved in Paid Promotion.

Where your content does include Paid Promotion, some jurisdictions and brand partners require that you inform viewers about any commercial relationship that might have influenced or contributed to your content – be that editorially or financially. It's your responsibility to check and comply with laws and regulations around Paid Promotion content that apply to you. See additional resources below.

Yes. We now offer an additional feature that enables creators to opt-in to a visible disclosure for viewers, which appears as a text overlay for the first few seconds when a viewer watches the video.

You can choose to add the paid promotion disclosure to any new or existing videos without having to upload a new video. If you add the paid promotion disclosure to an existing video, the video will keep its view count and other video metrics.

Use the paid promotion disclosure feature by following these instructions:

For any new or existing video that contains Paid Promotion, follow the steps above to check the "video contains paid promotion" box.

You'll see a second checkbox that says Help me inform viewers of paid promotion by adding a disclosure to this video. Additional disclosures for this video may be required under applicable laws.

Viewers will see this when they start watching the video on a computer or the latest version of the YouTube mobile app.

Note: Even if you use the paid promotion disclosure feature, keep in mind that different jurisdictions have various requirements for creators and brands involved in Paid Promotion that may require you to do more, so be sure to check and follow applicable laws.

No. YouTube's Ads Policy does not allow you to burn or embed advertiser-created and supplied video ads into your content or other commercial breaks where YouTube offers similar ad formats. If you have an advertiser interested in serving ads specifically against your content, please work with your partner manager to facilitate the transaction. See more information on our policies around third party embedded sponsorships.

This policy does not apply to videos created by or for brands and uploaded to the brand's YouTube channel.

Yes. We allow static title cards and end cards where there is a Paid Promotion for the purpose of disclosing this relationship or other sponsor or marketer attribution for the underlying content. These title cards and end cards can be graphical and contain the sponsor or marketer's logo and product branding.

Title cards: Five seconds or less and static. If they are placed at the beginning of the video (0:01s), the card must be co-branded with the creator's name/logo.

End cards: Placed within the last 30 seconds of the video and must be static.

Yes. The paid promotion disclosure feature and static title cards are open to all users, and you can also edit your video. You may wish to consider using these features to help viewers understand that they're watching content that includes Paid Promotion.